


The Box and The Guitar

by LastofMe



Series: Comparing Your Past To My Future [1]
Category: Doctor Who (2005), Fall Out Boy
Genre: Fluffy, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-22
Updated: 2015-07-22
Packaged: 2018-04-10 17:56:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,379
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4401683
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LastofMe/pseuds/LastofMe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Patrick's been having bad dreams and a stranger has just shown up on the tour bus.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Box and The Guitar

_He was running, churning stumbling over the rocky ground, pebbles spitting from under his feet. Falling with a gasp, he hauled himself back to his feet and clutched his side that had been bruised by a larger rock before shambling onward. He could see it glowing in the distance, a bright white light atop a dark blue dot. He was lost and alone without his guitar but the light in the distance was his only chance. He slipped again and found himself falling into an endless pit, crying out for help._

In reality he had only fallen out of his bed onto the hard floor of the bus. The door of his bunk flew open and three very concerned faces came through.

“Patrick, what happened?” Pete was kneeling next to him, staring into his eyes searching for a reason for the scream and thump that had woken him up.

“Yeah, bud, you’ve been doing this a lot lately. At least you’re more regular than my alarm clock!” Joe shook his mop of hair as he tried to make light of how concerned he really felt.

“I’m fine… I think… I just had a nightmare is all. I’m sorry I frightened you.” Patrick unwrapped his blanket from around his legs and drew his knees up to his chest.

Andy had watched the scene unfold from the doorway. Crossing his arms, he addressed the little group. “Come on guys. Let’s give him some air and get some breakfast. We’ve got four hours before we need to be ready at the venue.”

Pete clapped his hand on Patrick’s shoulder, causing him to rock back and forth. “We’re here for you buddy. Get some more sleep. I’ll come get you later.”

“Yes Mom,” Patrick muttered as he slipped back into bed and burrowed back under his blankets.

As the other two men left, Andy leaned over the little bed and the tuft of ginger hair peeking from under the covers twitched. “You know you can talk to us about anything, right? We’ve all been through some rough times, but we’re here for you.” The blanket man nodded and Andy gently shut the door behind him.

He headed down the narrow corridor of the bus into the living area. Joe and Pete were devouring bowls of cereal and milk at the little table. Pete had his little black notebook out, rereading something he had written. Joe was completely devoted to the task of eating, slurping the milk off of his spoon. Andy sat between them with his grapefruit half and mug of tea.

“Whad’he say?” asked Joe before he tipped the bowl back to drain it.

“Nothing yet, but it’ll come out sooner or later. Hopefully we’ll be able to find out without having a repeat of Milwaukee.”

Joe slammed down his bowl, “How else was I supposed to ride a mechanical bull in all 50 states? I can have life goals too! Pete! Back me up here!”

Pete rolled his eyes at Andy, “How long are we banned from that bar still?”

Andy stared at the microwave clock, “Four months, three weeks, two days. They had amazing tempeh wings…”

“We are not repeating Milwaukee.”

“I said I was sorry! I misread one sign and we can’t have fun. He falls out of bed every morning and we all cuddle him up. What gives here?”

Andy patted him on the head, “Because he’s the cute one and you’re the dork.”

“Mooom!” Joe whined, “Dad’s picking on me again!”  

Pete downed his milk and went back to his book, “Listen to your father.”

Joe was about to open his mouth to complain, but a sudden whoosing noise caught all of them off guard. They all leapt to their feet; Andy pushing the other two behind him as a large blue box began to materialize in their living space. The label on the top read “Police Public Call Box” and it had a white blinking light on top of it.

“Didn’t we see one of these in the museum we went to in London?” wondered Pete from Andy’s left shoulder.

“What’s it doing out of the museum and in our living room?” asked Joe. “Ouch! Andy, get off my foot.”

“Quiet! Pete, you will take Joe and get the rental car around to the back of the bus. I will get Patrick out of the window and meet you. Ready and…!” Andy never got to finish his sentence as the door to the box swung open to reveal a tall, lanky, floppy-haired man in a rumpled brown suit.

“So where are we going? And more importantly where am I?”

“Was’ goin’ on?” came the sleepy question from the doorway as Patrick, still in his T-shirt and boxer briefs, with a hat jammed on his head, rubbed sleep away from his eyes. The man from the box stared at Patrick intently, pulling what looked like a fat silver marker from the inside of the jacket. With the click of a button, the marker lit up green and began to make a high pitched whirring noise.  Andy pressed the other men back against the wall even harder; all three of them staring at Patrick. Patrick blinked several times as he stared hard at the stranger before bursting into tears.

“I…I never thought I’d hear another sonic again… You’re The Doctor aren’t you?” The stranger crossed the room and wrapped Patrick in his arms as Patrick bawled.

“Shh… shh. There, there its alright.”

“Ah ummm… Andy? Andy! Choking not breathing back here!” hissed Joe. Andy let go and the three of them and the three of them stood there awkwardly. The stranger had started crying as well and the two of them had sunk to the floor in a pool of tears. Pete reached over for the box of tissues on top of the mini-fridge and slid it in between the two of them. There was a lot of sniffling and nose blowing before the two men stopped crying and let go of each other to breathe.

“So Patrick,” asked Pete as nonchalantly as he could, “Who’s your friend?”

“And why does he have something from a museum that materialized in our living room and what’s that big silver thing?” Joe blabbered until Andy shot him a withering look.

Patrick stared at the floor, “He’s the Doctor. He’s a Time Lord; a group of people skilled at travel in time and spaces from the planet Gallifrey. The box is his TARDIS, which is basically a time and space machine. And I know him because… I am… was a Time Lord.”

There was absolute silence until Joe piped up again, “I have seen and heard some weird shit in my day, Patrick, but this takes the cake.”

Seeing Patrick’s lower lip starting to quiver again, The Doctor took the lead.

“Come on then!” he stood and pulled Patrick to his feet, “Let’s have a little jaunt in my TARDIS, shall we? I love your hat by the way, very cool.” He began herding the other three into the box.

“But we have sound check in… four… hours.” Pete’s protests died away as he stood in the massive control room.

“Wow!” Joe walked up to the center console and stared at the long glass tubes, “Please tell me that’s the world’s biggest bong.”

“What is a… bong?” asked the Doctor as he pulled on knobs and levers.

“You know… a pipe you can smoke weed with?”

“You humans were given one of the most powerful plants in the galaxy and all you do with it is burn it up? I’ll never understand humans.”

Andy had recovered from his shock, “So it’s substantially bigger on the inside and it goes through time and space? But what does it have to do with us?”

“Or with Patrick?” added Pete, but both men had to stop asking questions as the room lurched. After a few minutes, the motion stopped and The Doctor ran to the door and threw it open with a flourish.

“Come see Earth!” Joe, Andy and Pete walked cautiously over to the door. Sure enough, there was Earth. A pale blue dot swimming in a sea of black. The sun blazed off in the distance. As they took in the scene in amazement, a quiet voice came from the steps leading to the console.

“I ran away. From Gallifrey. The Doctor was my friend when we were boys at the Academy. Everyone picked on me because I was small and chubby and sang in the choirs with the girls. I wanted to be just like him and when he vanished, I was all alone. But when I looked into the Untempered Schism and saw the Time Vortex, I heard the most beautiful music and I had to find it. So I ran away too and I crashed my TARDIS (which I stole) outside of Chicago. I knew it meant I could never go back to Gallifrey, but nobody on Earth laughed at me for liking music. The people who are my parents… I just sort of made it seem normal that a little boy had showed up at their house.”

“And Gallifrey was destroyed a few years after I came to Earth, so I dreamed that The Doctor was out there and he might find me one day. I kept my sonic so I could prove that I was me. When you guys wanted me to sing in the band, I was scared because I thought you would laugh, but now look where we are.”

“So let me get this straight,” said Pete, “you ran away from home through space and time as a kid just so you could drive around the Midwest in a beat up old van with three other sweaty guys?”

“Well that’s a way to think of it. It’s just like the adventures we talked about having.” Patrick smiled up at The Doctor.

“Then perhaps this is the best time to tell you why I’m here. There is swarm of sonic mites headed for Earth. They look like very big mosquitoes but they love to eat sonic waves. A swarm this size could knock out communications for the entire planet. The TARDIS must have sent me to you because the mites are going to swarm in the same location as your concert tonight.”

“So giant space bugs are going to come eat my music? There is not enough pizza in the world that could make that manageable…” Pete sighed.

“Geez Pete, pizza isn’t the answer to everything,” replied Andy, “You know you can have too much of a good thing…”

He trailed off staring at The Doctor who looked at Patrick. “Exactly! You brilliant, scribbled-on man!” The Doctor planted a huge kiss on Andy’s cheek as he raced back to the controls. The TARDIS roared to life and when it stopped again, they were back on the bus. Barely a minute had passed since they had left. Patrick ran off the TARDIS and came back fully dressed, holding his guitar. Running his fingernail around a seam, a secret compartment popped open and a silver pen popped out.

“I turn it on every time I play, just in case you’re listening,” he added dipping his hat so no one could see him blush. At that moment a loud buzzing noise filled the room as an angry, black bug flew in through the window. Patrick plugged his guitar into the amp as The Doctor trapped the sonic mite under a juice glass. As he began to play the mite shrieked louder and buzzed harder until it exploded in a tiny firework, leaving a scorch mark on the carpet.

Pete looked at Patrick, “How do I get one of those?”

Patrick opened the compartment and pulled out the silver pen. Tapping another button, the pen open and he pulled out three small silver clips. “Put these on your instruments. They should amplify your sonic waves enough to make that,” he gestured at the floor, “happen on a much larger scale.”

“Well what are we waiting for? Lead on!” called The Doctor as the group ran off the bus.

The sound check went well with a few sparks falling from the sky as some adventurous sonic mites got a much larger snack than they expected. The meet and greet was successful, with The Doctor coming through with three different outfits to get pictures.

As Patrick waited off stage for his part of the show to begin, The Doctor wrapped him in a hug from behind. “You’re going to do great, you know and I’m so glad I got to see you one more time.”

“You’re going away again!?”

“My place is in the stars, while you have always been meant to be here with all these people cheering for you. I’ll make sure all the mites are gone and seal up that crack in the atmosphere so they can’t come back. But I’ll always be here for you. I’ve always been able to hear your music. If I’m not your hero I can never let you down right?”

Patrick turned to face him and The Doctor placed a hand gently on his cheek. They could see universes in each other’s eyes. But before he could reply, Pete dragged him out onto the stage. Looking out at the crowd, he heard the light buzzing of the mites and the TARDIS whooshing away. Every note they played caused a firework to explode although the fire department had been unable to find the source, the paper said the next day. But the band knew those little lights that caused the crowd to scream in delight were not pyrotechnics or fireflies, but the sound of them saving the world. Andy’s drum solo in particular caused the lawn to light up like midday. When they went on stage for their encore, the lights were all gone. They had done it. Patrick looked up to see the little light on top of the box flashing as it whirled away.

They congratulated themselves with pizza on the bus that night. And when the laughter had died away and Patrick was in bed, he found himself falling into a peaceful, dreamless sleep, his sonic tucked under his pillow.


End file.
